Nowadays you can find a website of just about anything. There are so many sites where people can share there interests, make their own profile, showing off how popular they are because they have 400 online “friends”. Almost everybody has an online profile at sites like Hyves, face book and my space. Sites like these are the way to stay easily connected to a lot of people. You can just leave a message under 7 seconds. The Dutch Hyves started in 2004.

According to the Hyves overview(www.hyvesoverzicht.nl/) there are over 7 million people in the Netherlands who are a member of Hyves. People even claim that someone who has Hyves is only 7 friends away from everybody in the world who has Hyves too. Now I don’t know if this is true but still. It shows how many people are actually on Hyves.

People put a lot of information on their online profiles like their last name, email addresses, schools, hometown and things like which sport they practise and where. Of course this can be very useful. It’s easier to connect with people if you know things about them. On “Bartuz” blog (bartuz.wordpress.com/2007/11/15/hello-world/) I even read that the police sometimes uses Hyves profiles to identify and/or track down criminals. I think it is great that the police can use criminals information against them. But there is a downside to it. This kind of information on the web can also create a lot of problems. You don’t know which people will look at your site. There are a lot of lunatics out there who can use your last name or school to track you down or stalk you. That’s why it can be useful to make your profile only visible for friends.

All the sms texting, MSN and Hyves does effect people’s vocabulary. People start using short references like LOL (laughing out loud) not only online or in a text message but in a actual conversation too. Is this the beginning of total destruction of language and vocabulary. Will these kind of short references appear in books too? God save us!

I wonder if in the future, when everything goes over the internet, people will still visit each other as much as they do now. Because of things like windows live messenger and Hyves, people can get things across in high speed. How long does it takes before classes are followed over the internet? You can order in food, buy your clothes over the internet . Will this effect our social life in the long run?

Last week I was searching Google for some entertainment. Now I don’t know exactly what I typed anymore but it was something like: glow in the dark Volleyball. I was a little surprised when I found out that something like a glow in the dark Volleyball net really exist.

Intrigued as I was, I tried to find more of these “inventions.” Not only did I find loads and loads of sites full of these ideas, they even have a name for it: Chindogu.

Chindogu, Japanese for unuseless object, is an invention that seems like an ideal solution to a particular problem. However, anyone who would actually attempt to use such an invention, would find that it causes so many new problems or such significant social embarrassment, that it isn’t worth using it.

According to the Chindogu rules (yes there are rules) you can’t sell or buy the unusseless tools. But I am sure that a lot of people can’t resist to put their Chindogu inventions for sale on the internet. And of course there would also be a lot of crazy people who would buy this junk. In al honesty, I have to say that I would be tempted to buy this kind of stuff myself.

For anyone who might be interested, here are the Chindogu rules :

The 10 Rules of Chindogu

1. “A Chindogu cannot be for real use”

2. “A Chindogu must exist”

3. “Inherent in every Chindogu is the spirit of anarchy”

4. “Chindogus are tools for everyday life”

5. “Chindogu are not for sale”

6. “Humour must not be the sole reason for creating a Chindogu”

7. “Chindogu is not propaganda”

8. “Chindogu are never taboo”

9. “Chindogus cannot be patented”

10. “Chindogu are without prejudice”

I’ve come across things like light bulbs that don’t work so you won’t be bothered with light that you don’t want, a hat with toilet paper on top for people with hay fever, a stick specially designed so you can press the ctrl, alt and delete button on your keyboard at the same time and loads of other stuff that is as useless as a third nipple.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s fantastic that someone can come up with these brilliant ideas. But how empty must your life be to create this kind of stuff in your free time? And how empty is my life for watching these ideas day after day in my free time?